(2) Turned his face toward the wall . . .--The royal couch was in the corner, as the Eastern place of honour, the face turned to it, as seeking privacy and avoiding the gaze of men. (Comp. Ahab in 1Kings 21:4.)

Verse 2. - Hezekiah turned his face toward the wall. The action resembles that of Ahab (1 Kings 21:4); but the spirit is wholly different. Ahab turned away in sullenness, Hezekiah that he might pray undisturbed Beds seem to have been placed in the corners of rooms, with the head against one wall of the room, and one side against another.

38:1-8 When we pray in our sickness, though God send not to us such an answer as he here sent to Hezekiah, yet, if by his Spirit he bids us be of good cheer, assures us that our sins are forgiven, and that, whether we live or die, we shall be his, we do not pray in vain. See 2Ki 20:1-11.Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall,.... Not figuratively to the wall of his heart, as Jerom; but literally, either to the wall of his bedchamber where he lay sick, that his tears might not be seen, and his prayers interrupted, and that he might deliver them with more privacy, freedom, and fervency; or else to the wall of the temple, as the Targum, towards which good men used to look when they prayed, 1 Kings 8:38, which was a type of Christ, to whom we should have respect in all our petitions, as being the only Mediator between God and man: and prayed unto the Lord; as follows: